Apple Cinnamon Cheesecake Recipe

[donotprint] Fruit topped cheesecakes are one of my most favorite desserts and I am really excited to have one of my most favorite baking friends, Jamie Lothridge of My Baking Addiction, share with us her fabulous Fall recipe for Apple Cinnamon Cheesecake. This dessert would be a great addition to your Thanksgiving menu or for any occasion for hosting family and friends.

I am so excited to be doing a guest post for Alice and Savory Sweet Life. I am Jamie, from My Baking Addiction, and I have a delicious recipe for Apple Cinnamon Cheesecake that I created and want to share with you. I can’t thank Alice enough for allowing me to be a part of her website during my favorite baking season of the year!

I am from Ohio, so when the fall season approaches, it comes in with a bang! It seems as if, overnight, the leaves are turning, there is a chill in the air, and the apples are plentiful. We went a little crazy last week at our local orchard, picking an abundance of Honey Crisps, Granny Smiths, and Jonagolds. As I stared at two giant bags of apples on my counter, I knew it was time to get a plan together and get to baking…what can be better than a fall spin on a classic dessert?

While strolling around the market, I came across a bag of gingersnap cookies and the inspiration for this cheesecake was born. The buttery gingersnap crust provided the base for the scrumptious pumpkin pie spiced filling, giving the cheesecake that true fall flavor. And now for the finale . . .spiced apple topping reminiscent of grandma’s apple pie filling, full of plump apples with a hint a caramel flavor to give it that extra autumnal appeal.

This recipe is easy enough to prepare for a weekend dinner, but it’s also upscale enough in presentation to serve at a dinner party or your upcoming holiday festivities. [/donotprint]

Directions
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Tightly wrap a 9 inch springform pan in heavy duty foil. This step prevents leaks when using a water bath. I also take the extra step by placing the foil wrapped spring form pan inside an oven bag while baking*.

2. Mix together the crust ingredients {gingersnap cookie crumbs, brown sugar, salt and melted butter} and press into the bottom of the pan and about 1 ½ inches up the sides. Bake for 7 minutes and cool completely on a wire rack.

3. Begin to boil a large pot of water for the water bath.

4. In the bowl of your stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, combine the cream cheese and sugar; mix until smooth {about 2 minutes}. Add eggs, one at a time,
fully incorporating each before adding the next. Make sure to scrape down the bowl in between each egg. Add heavy cream, pumpkin pie spice and vanilla; combine until
thoroughly incorporated and smooth in texture.

5. Pour batter into prepared crust. Place pan into a larger pan and pour boiling water into the larger pan until halfway up the side of the cheesecake pan.

6. Bake 45 to 55 minutes, the edges will appear to be set, but the center will still have some jiggle to it. At this point, close the oven door, turn the heat off, and let the cheesecake rest in the oven for at least one hour, but up to 3 hours. After the recommended cooling time has passed, carefully remove the cheesecake from the water bath and place on a cooling rack to cool completely. Once the cake is completely cooled, place it into the refrigerator for at least 5 hours.

7. Three hours before serving, prepare the apple topping.

8. Mix together the sugar, cinnamon, and nutmeg in a small bowl. In another bowl, sprinkle apples with the juice of ½ lemon and toss.

9. Melt butter over medium heat; whisk in flour and stir for about one minute. Slowly whisk in the apple cider followed by the sugar and spice mixture made in the previous step.

10. Add in the apples and cook until slightly tender {about 5-7 minutes} stirring constantly. Once apples have reached a desired texture and the sauce has thickened, remove pan from heat and stir in vanilla extract. Allow apple topping to cool completely before topping the cheesecake. Arrange apples on cheesecake and chill for at least one hour before serving.

Comments

This looks too good to be true! Lots of my favorite things all in one recipe. This is definitely going on the must try list for Thanksgiving. We always choose a few new recipes each year. As a side note: when I first read it, I read “spiked cheesecake” instead of “spiced.” LOL

This recipe looks great! I am in the middle of making it for a party tonight! I noticed that there are directions for putting nutmeg in the topping, but no ingredient amount. I’ll be guessing a quarter to half teaspoon!

What a delicious looking apple treat. I have so many apples this Fall from my trees and can’t figure out what to do with all of them. A girl can only eat so much applesauce LOL. Thanks for sharing this recipe.
*kisses* HH

This looks wonderful. I think I should try this out. But one quick question, what does preheating do to an oven or what does preheating the oven do to a recipe? I am not that quite knowledgeable about baking so I just want to know exactly what is the purpose. LOL

This is so mouth watering! I can’t resist this one and my hubby will surely make angry if I ask him to bake some of this for me. Lol. Or maybe this will be the time to bake for my own. Thanks for this recipe and wish me luck to make it right.

Made this cheesecake over the weekend and it was delicious!! It has now moved up to the top 3 in our household! My son and daughter-in-law said they want me to make it for Thanksgiving instead of the traditional pumpkin pie! This is a winner for anyone who loves cheesecake!

Thank you for sharing this wonderful recipe with us! I’ve decided that I will be making this cheesecake for my husband’s birthday this Friday. I must admit that I will be making a few small substitutions so that our recent return to the gym and healthy-eating habits don’t completely get voided. I’ll be reporting back to let you know how it turns out. I can’t wait! Is it Friday yet?!

Currently, I’m in the cooling stage of this delightful cheesecake! It smelled so wonderful when I mixed it, and baked it.
One thing I was confused about: In the list of ingredients for the topping. There wasn’t any mention of nutmeg. Then as I came to the directions, I was told to mix in the nutmeg, but no mention of brown sugar. So I decided to just add the brown and white sugars as well as the nutmeg! It smelled good.